BATON ROUGE, La. -- People who sold their hurricane-damaged homes before the start of the Road Home aid program now can receive homeowner grants, the state announced Tuesday.

The change could affect as many as 5,000 applicants who sold their homes before the Road Home started in 2006 but applied for aid through the program by the July 2007 deadline.

The Louisiana Recovery Authority said letters will be mailed to those applicants by the end of the week notifying them of their eligibility. They must return the letters indicating their interest by Sept. 5.

"This has been a long wait for these homeowners who sold their homes at a loss in the early days after the storms, and we are happy to serve them as we move through the final year of the Road Home program," Walter Leger, chairman of the LRA's Housing Task Force, said in a statement.

The Road Home provides grants of up to $150,000 to homeowners with severe damage from Katrina or Rita, based on the pre-storm value of the home minus the proceeds from sales, insurance and FEMA aid.

Nearly 115,700 homeowners have received grants from the program, totaling $6.8 billion so far. The Road Home is funded mainly with federal recovery aid, and state officials determined the program will have enough money remaining after doling out rebuilding, buyout and elevation grants to help those applicants who sold their homes before the Road Home began.

To receive grants, applicants must have owned the damaged property and used it as their primary residence when either Katrina or Rita struck in August and September 2005. They had to have applied for aid before the July 31, 2007, application deadline and attended their first program appointment by Dec. 15.

------

Further information is available at 1-888-762-3252 or online at www.Road2La.org.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)